Song of the Spirits (41 page)

“She’s gone? What do you mean, ‘She’s gone’?” Gwyneira asked, bewildered. She had come down to breakfast still a little sleepy. She and James had drunk a bottle of good wine to put Carmen behind them, and enjoyed a lovely night after that. And now, here was William, wanting something from her first thing. “Come, William, Kura doesn’t know how to ride, and she doesn’t drive. She can’t even have left Kiward Station.”

“She was a little hysterical yesterday. She might have misunderstood something.” William hemmed and hawed.

In truth, Kura had only cast a burning glance at him and Heather in bed, a glance that expressed something almost like hate. Or rather, disappointment, an unwillingness… William did not quite know how to gauge her expression. He had only seen it for a fleeting instant. After she had grasped what she was seeing, she had stormed out of the room. William knocked on her door immediately thereafter, but she had not answered. Nor when he tried again, or again after that. Finally, he gave up and retired to his own room, where he tossed and turned. Only at dawn did sleep finally overpower him.

When he’d woken up, he wanted to try once again to speak with Kura. When he went to her room, however, he found her doors wide open. And she was gone.

“Did you have a fight?” Gwyneira asked, groping for an explanation.

“Not exactly… Well, yes, but… For heaven’s sake, where could she be?” William appeared almost frightened. Kura had behaved so strangely. And though he would not admit it, he had found a letter she had written on the table in her dressing room.

It isn’t worth it.

Nothing more and nothing less. But Kura would not have done anything to herself, would she? William thought with horror about the lake next to the Maori village.

“Well, I would probably start by looking for her in Christchurch,” James said casually as he came down the stairs in excellent spirits. “Isn’t that where she wanted to go?”

“But not on foot,” William objected.

“Kura rode off with Tiare,” said Jack, who had just entered the room followed by his puppy. Apparently, he had already been out checking on things in the stables. “I asked if she wanted to say good-bye to Gloria, but she didn’t even look at me. Felt guilty, I bet, since Tiare was taking Owen without asking.”

“Maybe she looked in on Gloria earlier,” said Gwyneira, in an effort to make her granddaughter not appear to be such a horrible mother.

Jack shook his head. “Nah, Gloria slept with me. I just left her with Kiri in the kitchen. And Kiri didn’t say anything about Kura.”

“And you just let her take the horse?” William flared up at him. “That Maori boy comes here, takes a valuable horse and—”

“How was I supposed to know they didn’t ask?” Jack said calmly. “Tiare will definitely bring him back anyway. I’m sure they only drove to Christchurch for that absurd audition of Kura’s. They’ll be back tomorrow.”

“That I not believe,” Moana remarked. The housekeeper had been setting the table for breakfast when William had come downstairs with the news of Kura’s disappearance. Moana had gone straight upstairs to inspect Kura’s things. She felt no need to hold back, having served in the house for forty years and having raised Marama and Paul. Kura was like a very spoiled granddaughter to her. “She took big bag, all beautiful things, also evening dresses. Looks like big trip.”

Roderick Barrister rounded up the ensemble for a rehearsal shortly before their last opera recital in Christchurch. They needed to practice the quartet from
Il Trovatore
again. It had become an embarrassment, and his Azucena was only getting worse. The girl felt too much was being asked of her; she was suffering from the other dancers’ ridicule, and then there was this other business… Something would have to be arranged soon. Roderick asked himself how it could have happened. He had never impregnated any of his many lovers before. At least no one had ever told him if he had.

The girl’s failure in
Il Trovatore
was still bearable—worse was the scene from
Carmen
. It would be best to strike it altogether from the program and look for something else.
La Traviata
perhaps. He could stage that with Sabina. Although then she would be overtaxed in that role too, and she did not have a suitably consumptive look about her.

“Maybe if we place the ladies a bit further forward,” he considered, “Then a bit more of the song will come across.”

“Or, the men could just sing a bit more softly,” Sabina commented peevishly. “Piano, my friend. That should also extend into the higher range if you call yourself a tenor.”

The giggles of the dancers, who were slowly gathering for their entrance, mixed with the ensuing cries of protest from the man playing the role of Luna, as well as Roderick’s own objections.

And then a sweet voice suddenly sounded from the auditorium.

“
L’amour est un oiseau rebelle, que nul ne peut apprivoiser
…”

The “Habanera” from
Carmen
. But sung by a much stronger voice than that of the little dancer. Though this singer was not perfect either, all that was lacking was polish, voice formation, a little education. The voice itself was magnificent.

Roderick and the other singers, in a state of excited confusion, looked into the room. Then they saw the girl—wondrous in an azure-blue dress, her hair held in place with a Spanish comb just as Carmen herself must have worn. A Maori boy waited behind her.

Kura-maro-tini sang her aria to the end calmly and with great self-assurance—did she already recognize the amazement in the eyes of her spectators? Regardless, the singers onstage and the dancers backstage could not contain themselves. They applauded enthusiastically when Kura finished—the little mezzo-soprano who saw an end to her suffering—Roderick most of all. This girl was a dream—pretty as a picture, with a voice like an angel. And he could shape her.

“I need work,” Kura finally said. “But it looks like you need a mezzo-soprano. Can we come to an arrangement?”

She licked her lips lasciviously and held herself upright like a queen. Her hands played imaginary castanets. She had studied her Carmen. And she would wrap this impresario around her finger just as the gypsy had Don José.

E
laine’s determination to avoid becoming pregnant at all costs consumed her whole life. It sometimes seemed an irrational obsession, since, viewed objectively, a pregnancy could actually have improved her standing in the Sideblossom household. John, for one, did not seem to believe in pestering pregnant women with nightly visits. Indeed, he was increasingly absent as Zoé’s stomach grew rounder. His “business” sometimes took him to Wanaka, sometimes to Dunedin and even as far as Christchurch.

When he was home, he followed Emere with his eyes and occasionally touched her possessively. Though she cast looks of barely concealed hatred at him when he did so, Elaine suspected that she always obeyed his summons at night. Whenever she lay awake herself, she often heard noises in the corridors, ghostly sounds, as though someone were being dragged outside. Though Emere always moved gracefully, with swaying hips and measured step, on the days after the sounds, she appeared a little stiff. And whenever she left the house, she played the
putorino
—clear evidence that it really was she who slipped outside after nightfall rather than disappearing after dinner into the shelters with the other servants.

Emere elicited strange, almost human sounds from the exotic little instrument, which unsettled Elaine and made her anxious, as though the flute were mirroring her own torment. She hardly dared move when she heard it, out of fear that Thomas would awaken, for Emere’s music seemed always to rouse a particular rage in him. When he heard it, he would stand up, close the window abruptly, and try to further muffle the sound by drawing the heavy curtains. Though they could no longer hear the flute after that, Thomas would pace the room like
a caged tiger, and whenever Elaine dared to speak to him or draw his attention, he took his rage and excitement out on her. Elaine had tried insulating the room against every sound in advance. But then the air would become sticky and hot, and Thomas would wrench the window open after having his way with Elaine. Then she had to fear Emere’s playing all over again.

That, too, came to an end. Emere’s form began to grow round just like Zoé’s, and John left her alone.

Elaine’s relief did not last long, as John trained his lustful gaze on her next. He occasionally stroked her hip when he passed by or even casually touched her breast, pretending he was brushing a leaf or blade of grass from her hair. Elaine found his overtures detestable and did all she could to withdraw from his touch. When Thomas became aware of his father’s advances, he glared at his father and took his revenge out on Elaine afterward. From his perspective, she was encouraging practically every man she saw, and the fact that she was now trying to ensnare his father was the very pinnacle of insolence. She could deny it all she wanted. It was no use. Thomas was pathologically jealous. Elaine became increasingly nervous and haggard because of it. She never got used to his nightly visits and fits of jealousy—how could anyone get used to torture? Elaine knew this couldn’t be normal for married life, but she found no remedy for it. Even when she attempted to be inconspicuous and not create any friction with Thomas for which he would feel he had to “punish” her, it was at best only less bad—it was never painless.

It also proved nearly impossible to avoid the “dangerous” days, though Elaine made every effort to do so. Sometimes she would eat nothing for several days to render herself pale and fake a febrile illness. Or she would stick her finger down her throat, vomit several times, and declare that there was something wrong with her stomach. Once she even stooped low enough to eat soap because she had read that doing so would produce a fever. She did, in fact, become violently ill for two days—and hardly had energy on the third for her vinegar douche after Thomas had “visited” her again. The solution seemed to be working though. Elaine had yet to conceive.

She occasionally tried to talk Thomas into visiting Queenstown. She had to do something. She could not spend the rest of her life in Thomas’s prison! Perhaps she would find the courage to confide in her mother—and if she could not manage that, Inger or even Daphne. She would certainly know of something to make Elaine’s nights more bearable.

Thomas vetoed the idea outright. Elaine began to suspect that he was reading her mail. After she had woven a few hints of her boredom, her pent-up state in the house, and the unpleasantness of her nights into a letter to her mother, Thomas had descended on her with terrible savagery. He would run the boredom out of her, he declared to her, though she had never complained to him. Elaine suspected that Fleurette never received the letter.

She could only hope that her parents would come up with the idea to visit her themselves—but she knew how difficult that would be for them. Business was booming in Queenstown, making Ruben, at least, practically indispensable, and Fleurette would hardly travel so far alone to place herself under the roof of her old enemy, John Sideblossom, if there was not an urgent reason to do so. Thomas’s censorship kept Elaine from giving her such a reason.

Sometimes Elaine thought that a pregnancy might even help. Her parents would come for the birth, or no later than the baptism. But she rebelled wholeheartedly against the idea of bringing another life into this hell, not to mention the fact that a baby would shackle her to Lionel Station without hope of escape. So she carried on and hoped for a miracle. Although none was forthcoming, Patrick O’Mally returned to Lionel Station almost a year after her wedding.

The young Irishman was driving a heavy team that had just dropped off a heavy load of supplies in Wanaka.

Now, however, the wagon was empty, and a white horse was following him at a proud trot.

“Since I was already in the area, I thought I’d pay you a visit, Elaine, and bring you your Banshee. It’s a shame, her just standing around and you without a horse. The little stallion has been on its own for a while now and is filling out beautifully. Oh, and your
mother says you should write more often—and not just these small-talk letters. She’s almost getting a bit worried. Then again, no news is usually good news, right?” Patrick looked at her inquisitively. “Isn’t that right, Elaine?”